Scientific community suggest that weak environmental assessments of
veterinary drugs undermine regulations and can cause a vulture ecological disaster

A few days before the European Medicines Agency (EMA) is due to take a final decision regarding the banning of diclofenac – a
veterinary drug that causeskidney failure and deathof vultures, and thatdecimated vulture populations in Pakistan, India, and Nepal during the
1990s, and is now available in
Spain and Italy-, a large section of the European scientific community (including researchers in the advisory board of the VCF) published a paper this week in Science advocating the need to keep
harmful veterinary medicines out of the environment.

Margalida et al suggest thatresearchers and policymakers need to establish programs similar to those proposed for
human drugs to prevent the approval and use of veterinary drugs out there that can have impacts on scavengers. The authors call for the adoption of a more holistic system of screening veterinary
drugs that promotes environmental responsibility, involves all sectors of society and considers environmental effects during the production, use, and disposal of veterinary
medicines.

With the EMA
about to publish their scientific advice on the possible negative effects of diclofenac on Europe´s vultures - Spain harbours about 95% of the European Union’s vultures, as well as the
continent’s entire population of threatened Spanish Imperial Eagles and populations of Red Kites, we hope this latest call from the scientific community will help the EU Commission take the right
decisions:

Ban vet diclofenac

Change the EU guidelines on risk
assessment of new veterinary drugs to consider eco-toxicity factors

Help develop a comprehensive
programme of testing of toxicity levels of veterinary drugs to scavenging species